Isabel Allende Draws from Mother’s Life in Pandemic-Set Novel ‘Violeta’

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KQED

News Commentary, News, Politics

4.2 • 727 Ratings

🗓️ 28 January 2022

⏱️ 56 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Isabel Allende’s new novel, “Violeta,” opens in the midst of a pandemic, under quarantine conditions. Only it’s 1920 and the Spanish flu. Violeta has just been born; she spends her early life in the virus-induced social bubble that we’ve all come to know. Inspired by Allende’s own mother, Violeta is born into elite, but falls into a rural social stratum after the Great Depression. It’s a saga about family secrets, exiles and resilience, as well as a reflection on the century when the world became technologically modern and socially fractured. We’ll talk with Allende about the novel, her mother and writing through — and about — a pandemic. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:49.2	From KQED in San Francisco, I'm Alexis Madrigal.
0:53.6	Only a tiny group of people have ever become truly famous novelists.
0:55.5	Given the sexism of the publishing industry over the decades, a much tinier subset of famous novelists or women, and a vanishingly small
1:01.5	slice of those people are Latin Americans. In fact, there's actually only one, at least here in the
1:06.5	United States, and that's Isabella Yende, a longtime friend of Forum. She's got a new novel, Violetta,
1:12.4	which takes place in the 100 years between when the Spanish flu hit Chile and the coronavirus
1:17.6	pandemic. It's a saga about family secrets, exile of different types, and resilience,
1:23.5	a reflection on the century when the world became technologically modern and socially
1:27.2	fractured.
1:28.3	That's all next after this news.
	...

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